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Tommy Clufetos
School's Out For Young Rocker Tommy Clufetos
started playing drums at age six, and by his eleventh birthday he was
gigging nonstop. "I
started playing in my dad's band," Tommy says.
"We'd back old-time rock 'n' roll acts like Chuck Berry or
Jerry Lee
Lewis. All I've ever wanted to do is play drums, and I've done every
kind of gig under the sun, from Bar
Mitzvahs to the opening of a hot
dog stand. I've loved it all."
Tommy's major break came in
2001, when he
landed the gig with Ted Nugent. "I was twenty-one then
and went on to work with Ted for three years," the drummer
explains.
"He taught me so much about feel. For Ted's brand of rock, he wants
everything really pushed and on top.
It's not about the chops, but
about the feel and groove." Tommy plays on Nugent's 2002 album, Craveman,
and appears on the live DVD Full Bluntal Nugity.
In 2003, Nugent headlined a tour with Alice Cooper. When
longtime
Cooper drummer Eric Singer left to tour with KISS in 2004, Tommy
stepped into the gig. "I saw Alice when I was
fifteen and thought, One
day I'm going to be in that band. And here I am!"
Clufetos admits noticing a difference
in feel between playing songs
from the original Alice Cooper group, which featured drummer Neal
Smith, and songs from
Cooper's solo career, recorded by a variety of
drummers. "There are definitely more intricate drum parts in the
original
Alice Cooper material, and you really have to understand that
that was a band,"
he explains. "I try to recreate that
feeling when playing those songs
and replicate the parts as authentically as possible, adding our own
energy on
stage."
Gail Worley
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